Page:Ancient Accounts of India and China.djvu/21

Rh thus he delivers himself by way of Preface to the little he says of the chief Cities of this Country: "China is, on the West, bounded by the Desart which divides it from the Indies; on the South, by the Sea, as also on the East; on the North, by the Countries of Gog and Magog, and others we know nothing at all of. Geographers, it is true, have the Names of many Places and Rivers in China; but as we are ignorant of the Pronounciation as well as of the real State of the Country, they are to us as it were unknown; and the rather as we have no Body that has been there, of whom to inform ourselves as we ought; wherefore we will confine ourselves to what has been written before us." After this he ventures to name some Cities, but so disguised, that it is impossible to guess at them, except Khansa, which may be the Quinsai of Marco Polo, and Zeilun, which he also mentions. In another Place he speaks of Cambalic or Chanbalig, and Catai, upon the Testimony of Ebn Said: These Passages Muller has recurred to; and they, it must be said, confirm what the Author himself confesses of the little Knowledge he had of those Parts. With the same Incertitude he declares himself at the beginning of his Universal History.

The Arabians have related nothing but the Fables about it.

But we must not wonder Abulseda knew so very little of China, for the rest that speak of it, tell us nothing but idle Tales and Absurdities, if we except some Pas-